Pages

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

How Would Readers Respond, Real Life

My co-worker and I, I'll call her Schmegan, (no I won't, that's just ridiculous) are doing our usual thing- yelling through our cube walls to carry on a completely inane conversation. Today's was about a romance novel that she's reading. (She's always reading romance novels. It's what I don't understand about her.) Apparently, she hates the main character in this new book, as it's already obvious that the character is going to cheat on her fiance out of boredom. He's a nice guy, I guess.

You have to wonder - in this situation, are your readers going to route for the nice-guy fiance, or are they going to hope for the lurid affair? It's the same for any decision a character has to make. Will readers be for or against it? And while a writer can certainly persuade the audience to feel a certain way, I'm sure that they can't always get the intended result.

This reminded me of something, this presentation of plot. And I'm wondering if anyone else out there does this also.

I yelled over/through the wall: "Have you ever had a really big decision to make and so you think about your life like a story you might be reading and think about what the reader's reaction might be to both of your choices and decide that way?"

Her answer: "No! But that's a really good idea!"

I'm sure only the bookish would be inclined to ever think this way, but maybe I'm just being prejudiced. Or maybe, I'm the only crazy out there. What do you think?